In this book, studies and essays by the author are collected from his over twenty-year engagement with issues of the critical decade of 1940-1950. These studies are distinguished into published and unpublished and have undergone partial revision and supplementation. They cover a wide range: the Battle of Crete and the guerrilla war in Pindos, aspects of the civil conflicts, both of the Occupation and the total Civil War of 1946-1949, issues of post-war memory management and representations of the period in mass culture, book presentations and book reviews of works related to the era, as well as issues related to the European dimensions of the Second World War.

We believe that a new perspective is required on these decisive and turbulent times of our collective life, especially in the current conjuncture in which ghosts of the past seem to be revived. A perspective that should approach, as impartially as possible, and with the necessary empathy, the personal and collective tragedies as well as the heroism of people, both protagonists and "unknown". We hope that the reader will discern in these texts efforts that move in this specific direction.